“Let Them All Become Che”
“Let Them All Become Che”
Creating the New Man in Cuba
This chapter focuses on Cuba's revolutionary effort toward creating a new man in the 1960s. As Fidel Castro aspired to achieve a quick triumph of communism on the island, the idea of the new man—or “Let them all become Che,” as the slogan of the time proclaimed—was created to precipitate communism and to offset the economic and technological shortcomings of the nation with revolutionary consciousness and sacrifice. In comparison with China's experience, Cuban efforts to create such a new man progressed more rapidly and reached the summit in the late 1960s, as Castro launched his Revolutionary Offensive. Following the failure of the offensive in 1970, the “new man” rhetoric was significantly toned down and has often been manifested defensively—to fend off foreign and imperialist ideological influence rather than to create a new human species.
Keywords: Fidel Castro, Cuba, communism, Revolutionary Offensive, imperial ideology
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